Thursday, January 19, 2012

He who has a Right to Work, has a Right to Profit - by Frederick Bastiat

XII. -He who has a Right to Work, has a Right to Profit

“Brethren, you must club together to find
me work at your own price.” This is the right to work; i.e., elementary
socialism of the first degree.
“Brethren, you must club together to find me work at my own price.”
This is the right to profit; i.e., refined socialism, or socialism of the
second degree.
Both of these live upon such of their effects as are seen. They will
die by means of those effects which are not seen.
That-which is seen, is the labour and the profit excited by social combination.
That which is not seen, is the labour and the profit to which this same
combination would give rise, if it were left to the tax-payers.
In 1848, the right to labour for a moment showed two faces. This was
sufficient to ruin it in public opinion.
One of these faces was called national workshops. The other, forty-five
centimes. Millions of francs went daily from the Rue Rivoli to the national
workshops. This was the fair side of the medal.
And this is the reverse. If millions are taken out of a cash-box, they
must first have been put into it. This is why the organizers of the right
to public labour apply to the tax-payers.
Now, the peasants said, “I must pay forty-five centimes; then I
must deprive myself of some clothing. I cannot manure my field; I cannot
repair my house.”
And the country workmen said, “As our townsman deprives himself
of same clothing, there will be less work for the tailor; as he does not
improve his field, there will be less work for the drainer; as he does
not repair his house, there will be less work for the carpenter and mason.”
It was then proved that two kinds of meal cannot come out of one sack,
and that the work furnished by the Government was done at the expense of
labour, paid for by the tax-payer. This was the death of the right to labour,
which showed itself as much a chimera as an injustice. And yet, the right
to profit, which is only an exaggeration of the right to labour, is still
alive and flourishing.
Ought not the protectionist to blush at the part he would make society
play?
He says to it, “You must give me work, and, more than that, lucrative
work. I have foolishly fixed upon a trade by which I lose ten per cent.
If you impose a tax of twenty francs upon my countrymen, and give it to
me, I shall be a gainer instead of a loser. Now, profit is my right; you
owe it me.” Now, any society which would listen to this sophist, burden
itself with taxes to satisfy him, and not perceive that the loss to which
any trade is exposed is no less a loss when others are forced to make up
for it, such a society, I say, would deserve the burden inflicted upon
it.
Thus we learn, by the numerous subjects which I have treated, that,
to be ignorant of political economy is to allow ourselves to be dazzled
by the immediate effect of a phenomenon; to be acquainted with it is to
embrace in thought and in forethought the whole compass of effects.
I might subject a host of other questions to the same test; but I shrink
from the monotony of a constantly uniform demonstration, and I conclude
by applying to political economy what Chateaubriand says of history:-

“There are,” he says, “two consequences in history; an
immediate one, which is instantly recognized, and one in the distance,
which is not at first perceived. These consequences often contradict each
other; the former are the results of our own limited wisdom, the latter,
those of that wisdom which endures. The providential event appears after
the human event. God rises up behind men. Deny, if you will, the supreme
counsel; disown its action; dispute about words; designate, by the term,
force of circumstances, or reason, what the vulgar call Providence; but
look to the end of an accomplished fact, and you will see that it has always
produced the contrary of what was expected from it, if it was not established
at first upon morality and justice.”